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Wednesday, June 9, 2010

Milani Intense Metals

As soon as the first pictures of the Milani Liquid Metal collections showed up on the MUA nail board, I started keeping an eye out for them on my drugstore rounds. The Cool Shades (2.0, Dot Com, I'm Online, Just Browsing, My Network, and PC Girl) eventually showed up at CVS (and I bought them all; I should swatch them sometime), but then weeks passed with no Intense Colors to be found. Swapping to the rescue! Jackie of Candy Coated Tips was able to find two of colors I wanted—Melt Down (cool red) and Molten Rock (blue)—and sent them to me in exchange for some other pretties I had extras of. That just left Hot Metal (purple) to track down, because, in a surprising turn of events, I decided I could skip the other three in the collection: Melt in the Sun (yellow orange), Metal Gear (orange), and Melt With U (warm red). I figured I could find a swap for Hot Metal at some point, but it turned out I didn't need to; before I'd even had a chance to add the polishes Jackie'd sent to my spreadsheet, I came across a display with one purple left--the first and so far only Intense Colors display I've seen around here. Funny how that works sometimes.

Left to right: Melt Down, Hot Metal, Molten Rock.

Melt Down is a beautiful ruby red which applied so nicely I only needed two coats (all swatches today are without top coat but I did use a base coat). The finish looks to me like a combination of a metallic and a micro glitter.

Hot Metal is a plummy pinkish purple; the finish on this one is different than the other two—no metallic flavor but rather a combination of micro glitter and glass flecked. I used three coats of this and needed every one.

Molten Rock is rich turquoise blue; the finish was similar to Melt Down but leaned more toward metallic than micro glitter. I used three coats but probably could have stopped at two.

i really appreciated your description of the finishes! have you noticed that all the brands are going this route this summer? sally hansen, $0PI, OPI, Zoya, Milani, etc are doing the micro glitter/glass fleck/jl;ajfaonvi polishes (couldn't think of the third word)?